A Helping Hand Behind the Scenes

November 14, 2023

We love celebrating an occasion and putting up some festive decorations here at CH Towers. But if we’re honest, the last few Halloweens have been a bit of a flop. So, we were determined to kick-off the spooky season in a fun way.

Here’s how we created our very own ‘Thing’ to lend a hand around the studio!

None of our clients have specifically requested a mangled, cut-off hand before… can’t imagine why. So, hand on heart, we weren’t quite sure where to start. But that added to the fun and we learnt new and useful skills along the way.

A woman 's hand is sitting on a blue table next to a white object.

Research, Test, then More Research

To really sell the idea, our goal was to feature a couple of shots with the hand completely detached. Luckily there have been a lot of iterations of ‘Thing’ over the years, but we found the best tips and tricks were from the BTS of Netflix’s ‘Wednesday’.

A woman is standing next to a bed in a dark room.

We wanted our version of the hand to be more feminine in its personification, similar to ‘Lady Fingers’ (‘Thing’s’ fiancé) from the original Addams’s Family series. This meant less of the scars and more of the vampy red nails.

Producer Lauren loves everything Halloween so of course, we had our cast sorted straight off the bat.

We did an initial test using a piece of green card for the backdrop, and to cover Lauren’s arm. A great first attempt, but it was missing a lifelike edge. Nothing a quick trip to Hobbycraft can’t fix!

Whipping out our VFX skills and layering some modelling wax around the edge helped create more of an illusion where the wrist was cut-off by the green.

A person is holding a tablet in front of a green screen.

A Trick of the Light

To avoid dedicating hours of time to each shot, we had to be clever with our approach. This meant filming a lot of POV or partial view angles that gave the impression of the hand independently running around the office without the need of a green screen. Set design also played a big part in how we captured the hand in-situ.

One of our personal favourites is the lollipop bursting out of the sweet box. It required a hell of a lot of double-sided tape and table arrangement, and let’s not forget about that spooky lighting. DOP Sam loved adding an extra bit of depth to scene, with a ‘bokeh’ effect and some warm orange tones highlighting ‘Thing’s’ best side.

A woman 's hands are reaching out from a blue box.

A ‘Thing’ of Beauty

Once we had the shots, it was a case of keying out Lauren’s arm, adding camera movement, and increasing the speed to give the whole Thing an unnatural vibe. Couple this with some creepy music, a spooky colour grade, and we’ve nailed it.

So, if you ever need a disembodied hand to walk through your frame - who ya gonna call?

< Older Post

Newer Post >

Share this post:

Why In-Housing Your Video Team Might Not Pay Off

By Emily Blanden • April 9, 2026

Lots of brands are pulling video production in house. On paper, it sounds efficient but in practice? We’re seeing a different story. Here’s what often gets overlooked. You’re Hiring Individuals - Not a Creative Team Once you factor in salaries, kit, software and overheads, most businesses end up with one or two junior to mid creatives. Talented, yes. But limited in scope. An agency gives you directors, animators, writers, cinematographers, strategists… activated only when you need them. Creativity Gets Stuck In house teams work on the same brand day in, day out. Agencies work across sectors, styles and problems and that cross pollination is where the best ideas come from. Retention Gets Hard and Expensive Strong creatives crave variety and progression. Small teams can’t always offer it, and when one person leaves, the whole system wobbles. Replacing technical talent is costly and the “savings” of in housing disappear fast. Who’s Challenging the Brief? Executing a brief is one thing. Challenging it is another. You should have someone asking, “Is this the right format?” or “What if we did it differently?”. That’s where outside perspective becomes invaluable.

EVCOM Top 50 Update

By Madeline Moores • April 7, 2026

We're #23 in the UK Top 50 Big news from us! CH Video have climbed 7 places in the EVCOM (Event & Visual Communication Association) + Moving Image UK Top 50.

CH x Euronics: Going the Extra Mile

By Gary Wales • March 26, 2026

When Euronics came to us with a brief, it was a good one: take a true story about an extraordinary delivery and turn it into something worth watching. The Brief Joe, a Euronics delivery agent, had been tasked with getting a chest freezer to a customer in rural Wales. The road ran out. He carried on anyway, on foot, through fields, across rivers and over hills. The customer was delighted. The story deserved to be told. Euronics asked us to produce a short comedic video retelling that journey. The challenge was finding the right visual language to match the scale of the tale. The Concept We pitched several approaches centred on a comic-book aesthetic, bold, energetic and a little tongue-in-cheek. It felt like the right fit: a story that was equal parts heroic and absurd, told in a style that leaned into both. The concept paired real interview footage of Joe with AI-generated visuals to bring his journey to life. Where a traditional shoot would have required location days across Welsh countryside, generative AI gave us the tools to illustrate the story scene by scene. Creative Wrangling We filmed Joe against a studio blue backdrop, letting him tell the story in his own words. His delivery did a lot of the heavy lifting (puns intended!), dry, matter-of-fact and quietly brilliant. The AI-generated visuals were built around detailed multi-angle reference sheets for Joe, the Euronics van and the chest freezer.

All posts